The Top 10 Things I Learned the "Hard Way" to Put in My Hotel Contracts

A well-written contract means that both the planner and the hotelier have their business needs met. Reaching this level of agreement means that both sides must have an understanding of the other's "must's" and "nice-to-have's" and the motivation behind the request. Both meeting planners and hoteliers need to be very clear on their needs and how those translate into contract language. This session is not given from a legal perspective, but from a planner's actual experiences.

In this webinar, we will start where any good agreement should start - the RFP. We will then discuss how knowing your own business (as a planner) and your customer's business (as a hotelier) can make for a better agreement for both parties. We will then work our way through good, detailed language that can be used in a contract.

This webinar will discuss the top 10 things that you MUST have in every contract you sign. This webinar will provide you with contract language suggestions, negotiation tips and a deeper understanding of how to approach your next contract discussion.

Learning Objectives:

• List of the 10 things to include in your next contract.
• Master the business components of a hotel contract.
• Learn the contract language you can use in your next contract.

Presented by:

Daphne J. Meyers, CMM, is the managing partner of RED BARN GROUP, LLC, a firm specializing in strategic meeting, training and event best practices. Red Barn Group clients include corporate, non-profit and civic organizations. She specializes in guiding event teams to exceed their goals and objectives through strategic planning, analysis, and collaboration.

Daphne's consulting practice has two primary focuses. The first is coaching clients to maximize their event investment. This varies from helping them hire the right suppliers to project managing their event to how to structure their businesses to operate in the current business environment. The other focus of her practice is education. This includes numerous speaking engagements for a variety of meetings industry and non-industry groups on business issues. Her education focus also enables her to teach Events Planning at Minnesota State University - Minnesota.

Daphne is a former Program Manager for Partner Events at Microsoft. During her eight years with Microsoft and Great Plains, she managed multi-million dollar events for the partner reseller channel and employees. In this capacity, she managed all aspects of highly visible events; prepared 100's of speakers to deliver content to 1000's of attendees; solicited and managed 100's of sponsors and exhibitors; facilitated stakeholder groups; and built and sustained successful event teams. Prior to Microsoft, Daphne spent eight years honing her planning skills at a variety of organizations.

In 2001, Daphne attained her Global Certification of Meeting Management (CMM) from Meeting Professionals International (MPI). CMM is the highest attainable professional designation for event professionals. Being a CMM means DAPHNE'S event planning focus is on the overall strategic success of an event.

In the fall of 2005, Daphne launched the first event planning course for Minnesota State University-Moorhead within the Mass Communications Department and still teaches it today.

Daphne has been a member of Meeting Professionals International (MPI) since 1996. From 2004-2005 she served on MPI's Global Corporate Circle of Excellence and was involved in the writing of three industry position papers on Strategic Meetings Management. As an extension of her work on the position papers, Daphne is currently serving as one of only three MPI Strategic Meetings Management speakers for International conferences. For 2009-10, Daphne is serving as the Vice President of Leadership Development for the Minnesota MPI Chapter.

Who would benefit from this program:

• Beginning to intermediate planners that have responsibility for producing hotel RFP's and reviewing contracts.
• Hoteliers that want to have better contracts in place to offer to their customers.
• Anyone who has signing responsibility of hotel contracts.

Continuing Education:

• This program has been approved for 1.5 recertification points and .15 initial application points toward CMP Certification through the Convention Industry Council (CIC). For more information about CMP certification or recertification, please visit the CIC homepage.

Product Options:

• Audio Conference CD Only: $229.00 (includes S&H)

Length: 1 hour 30 minutes